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Republican Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky recently told Raw America that even Trump’s most loyal Republicans in Congress are quietly cheering on his push to expose Jeffrey Epstein’s co-conspirators. President Donald Trump was caught nodding off in full view of the media during a 9/11 memorial ceremony at the Pentagon. Michigan Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers’ voting record is under new scrutiny after Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed pointed out how he voted against healthcare benefits for 9/11 first responders. And a senior campaign staffer for a Republican senator in a tight reelection battle once used a photo of SS soldiers as his Facebook profile picture and even curated a playlist celebrating a white ethnostate.
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Raw America Capitol Hill correspondent, Luke De Cresce, recently spoke with Republican Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky just before House Speaker Mike Johnson gaveled the House of Representatives out of session until after the midterms.
Massie — along with Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna of California — has been the leading voice demanding justice for the victims and survivors of convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirators. He even used a floor speech to read aloud the names of several people who have been named in the Epstein files, including top Wall Street bankers and corporate executives, to demand they face justice. Massie has also introduced new legislation aimed at forcing Donald Trump’s Justice Department to immediately hand over all remaining documents still being kept hidden away from the public.
The timing of the lengthy recess is notable: Johnson sent lawmakers home almost immediately after the Kentucky Republican made that speech and introduced the new bill. Massie doesn’t think the extended paid vacation was a coincidence. He’s previously suggested Johnson doesn’t want the Epstein issue hanging around the necks of Republicans who are already fighting for their political lives heading into the midterms.
Outside the Capitol, Raw America asked Massie directly whether he’d had any blowback from members of his own party for directly naming Epstein’s associates and reading their names into the Congressional record. Massie said there had actually been “none whatsoever,” and that his colleagues were actually privately cheering him on.
“As long as they don’t have to read [the names], they don’t care if I do,” Massie said with a laugh.
It’s important to remember that Trump has repeatedly called the Epstein issue a “Democratic hoax” despite promising multiple times on the campaign trail to release the files to the public. And even the president’s most loyal Republicans support Massie being the one to expose Epstein’s associates, as it keeps the heat off of them. The Kentucky lawmaker is also a lame duck with nothing left to lose, as he lost the Republican primary to a Trump-backed challenger several months ago.
Attorney General Todd Blanche — who was once Trump’s personal criminal defense attorney — is still sitting on roughly two million pages of documents that have yet to see the light of day. And he’s doing it in direct defiance of legislation Trump himself signed into law last fall. Every day Blanche keeps them hidden is another violation of federal law.
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Donald Trump appeared to fall asleep during a 9/11 memorial ceremony at the Pentagon on Friday, and the video of the embarrassing moment is spreading like wildfire.
Today marked the 25th anniversary of the attacks that killed more than 3,000 people in New York City, the Pentagon and on United Flight 93, which crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The 80-year-old president sat on stage alongside First Lady Melania Trump for a memorial service honoring those who died in the September 11 attacks.
The solemn ceremony featured speakers reading the names of victims one by one, which was followed by a ringing of a memorial bell. During this portion of the service, Trump’s eyes grew heavier until they closed altogether. His head rocked back and forth as he battled to stay awake. He appeared to nod off yet again during a choir performance later on in the service.
Clips of the president’s catnap immediately went viral. One post shared thousands of times read, “A Sleepy Donald Trump has decided to take a nap at the Pentagon Ceremony.” Another poster called Trump’s public sleeping “Utterly embarrassing” for the country, adding that the president “can’t even keep his eyes open at the 9/11 ceremony.”
Imagine for a moment how swiftly the media outlets owned by right-wing billionaires would condemn a Democratic president who fell asleep during a 9/11 memorial service, and then ask yourself why none of them are leading with this story on their front pages or their evening primetime newscasts.
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In the race for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat, Republican nominee Mike Rogers — who was once a member of the House of Representatives — has spent the last few weeks attacking Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed over old tweets referencing 9/11. Those posts were rather innocuous, as El-Sayed, who was director of Detroit’s Health Department at the time, was simply calling for Americans to unite to stop the Covid-19 pandemic in the same way Americans united after the 9/11 attacks.
But now, Rogers is having to defend his own congressional voting record after it was revealed that voted against the James Zadroga Act of 2010, which funded healthcare benefits for thousands of 9/11 first responders who were affected by the toxic debris in and around Ground Zero. Congress ultimately passed the bill in spite of Rogers’ no vote and opposition from more than 100 other Republican lawmakers. Rogers once argued in committee that the bill’s $5.1 billion cost “jeopardizes the financial health of the United States.” The legislation covered treatment for more than fifty types of cancer linked to exposure to the toxic materials in the rubble of the Twin Towers.
9/11 first responder John Feal, who lost part of his foot at Ground Zero, has spent years lobbying for those benefits. He told the Guardian he remembered having a conversation with Rogers on the floor of the House of Representatives during debate over the Zadroga Act. According to Feal, Rogers called the plight of 9/11 first responders “a New York problem” and cited concerns over the bill’s cost.
Feal never forgot about Rogers’ no vote, calling it a betrayal. He also pointed out that Republicans like Mike Rogers seem to love law enforcement and firefighters until one of them gets hurt or sick on the job and can no longer work. Then they cease being a hero and are treated instead as a burden.
Rogers has also had to walk back his implication that he personally witnessed Osama bin Laden’s dead body — a claim he put in writing in his own campaign literature. But Rogers never took part in the 2011 SEAL Team Six raid in Abottabad, Pakistan, nor was he in the White House Situation Room watching it unfold. Rogers’ campaign has so far stayed quiet on the issue, and is likely hoping to avoid having to answer more uncomfortable questions about his claims.
25-year-old Stephen Woytek was the political director for Ohio Republican Senator Jon Husted’s reelection campaign up until recently. Husted fired him after it was revealed that Woytek once used a photo of Nazi soldiers for his profile picture on Facebook. Woytek also assembled a playlist of songs celebrating Rhodesia — the now-defunct white nationalist nation that brutally ruled over a predominantly Black population in Africa.
Woytek was rapidly climbing the career ladder up until these new details came to light. Husted made Woytek his political director last month just as he’s battling for another six-year term against longtime former Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown, who is slightly ahead of him in recent polls.
Woytek said he’s part of a military reenactment group that dresses as the 1st SS Panzer division and that the reenactments are strictly educational and non-political. He emphasized that his interest in reenacting historical battles is purely to educate others about history.
However, he offered no such explanation for the Rhodesia-inspired playlist. White supremacists have long viewed Rhodesia as a symbol of their cause, and has been celebrated by mass murderers. The man behind the deadly 2023 shooting at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida wore a Rhodesia patch on his tactical vest as he shot and killed three Black people.
Republicans have lately been dogged by the pattern of people who embrace Nazi and white supremacist ideology worming themselves deep into GOP campaigns. The Husted campaign notably didn’t provide any answers to questions about how thoroughly they vetted Woytek before elevating him to one of the most senior roles on the senator’s reelection campaign.
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We take pride in putting the stories that the billionaires don’t want reported front and center. That includes Thomas Massie’s fight to bring Epstein’s rich and powerful co-conspirators to justice, exposing Mike Rogers’ record voting against healthcare benefits for 9/11 first responders and many more stories. None of that would be possible without paying subscribers who believe in independent journalism enough to directly support it. We can’t thank you enough.
I’m John Byrne, in for British Chris. If you haven’t yet, click the ❤️ and restack this post so we can reach the people who need to hear these stories. Thanks for reading, and thanks for supporting independent media.
